Remembering Manfred Goldberg (1930-2025) ✎

Manfred Goldberg has recently died.

He was a Holocaust survivor with a moving story.

I was listening to talk he gave to the University of Sussex. It was beautiful. 

I was most struck by his thoroughly pleasant & generous disposition when talking about his life story and the horrors he witnessed.

What’s interesting to me is the ordeal Manfred Goldberg’s father had to go through to secure papers to flee Nazi Germany. I forget how hard it was for Jews to get papers and leave - and, even worse, if you had a move a whole family to a foreign place. And then start again. His father managed to get out of Nazi Germany first (reference is made to Frank Foley) and had planned on taking the rest of the family with him afterwards on arrival in England. But within days, WWII had started. So, his poor wife and her two little babies were left behind in Nazi Germany. I just can’t imagine the toll on them both - esp. the wife. All alone without her partner/support and she had to look after 2 small kids who don’t understand what’s going on. Her strength and resolve must have been incredible. Hard not to have tears thinking about her despairing condition, while he was giving his talk.

For 6 years, his father, as refugee, was looking for his lost family. The strain that must have taken. He was also in a foreign country and couldn’t speak English, without the knowhow to get going with his life.

And then there’s the account of Manfred being squeezed onto a barge, like animals, in the Baltic sea, with so many prisoners, and being at the mercy of a true psychopath and sadist Captain. Tissues are needed at this point.

The wonderful part, for me, is that - having been reduced to the lowest rung of subsistence a human being can endure - he was honoured by the King of England and awarded an MBE, also met the Prince of Wales.

I wish I’d met him.

Terence Stamp (1938–2025) RIP ✎

A legend has died recently.

I simply loved him in The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, he was incredible.

In case people are interested, I have appendix-ed below a very interesting obituary. He seems to have led a fascinating life. I feel a little jealous. Being young in the 60s seems so much more exciting than to be young now.

Though this line in the obituary (with respect to Shrimpton) made me laugh -- “I was keeping 10 per cent but had intended to present her with a lump sum as a surprise”. 

Thanks for giving us great movies.

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Extra: 

In the Telegraph Obituaries, “Terence Stamp, glamorous actor who epitomised Swinging London then ran away to India”:

Propelled to fame in the early Sixties by films such as Billy Budd and The Collector, Stamp seemed to be Britain’s answer to Clint Eastwood or Robert Redford. He fell in with a group of glamorous folk including Mick Jagger, David Bailey and Jean Shrimpton, whose photographs did much to sell magazines throughout the decade.

By the late Sixties, and after a highly visible split with Jean Shrimpton, however, the self-styled “icon” found himself alone, and disillusioned with what he had once described as the “paradise of publicity”. He surprised his contemporaries by leaving London for Rome, where Pasolini cast him in Teorema, as an angelic stranger who makes love to every member of a bourgeois Italian family. The film was confiscated for obscenity after it was screened at the Venice film festival, and Stamp left Europe for India.

Stamp with Jean Shrimpton in 1965 Credit: Terry Disney

Terence Stamp spent most of the Seventies living in Poona, wearing a dhoti and practising yoga. He adopted celibacy, macrobiotics and distinguished himself from other followers of Krishnamurti by a devout interest in the philosopher’s dress sense. “He’d slipped on a powder-blue wool shirt over the green one,” he recalled of the guru. “The two colours looked good on him.” After his meeting with Krishnamurti, Stamp spent some time learning to whirl with dervishes before returning to Britain to appear in Superman in 1978.

In later life Terence Stamp gained a reputation – matched only by that of Shirley MacLaine – as an enthusiastic follower of what he described as “the path towards enlightenment”. Stamp re-established his career in the Eighties (“I need to be able to pay my rent and buy a bus pass”) but preferred to spend his free time reading philosophical texts and reciting mantras while standing on his head.

He was Oscar-nominated for his role in Peter Ustinov’s Billy Budd Credit: Silver Screen Collection

Terence Henry Stamp was born on July 22 1938 in the East End of London, the son of a Thames tug-boat pilot. Having taught himself to read by studying his mother’s Woman’s Own magazine, he began to show an avid interest in the astrological predictions of Gypsy Petulengro. “I was completely misguided,” he recalled. “I spent my whole early life believing myself to be a Leo. It wasn’t until 1968 that I discovered I was really Cancer.”

Stamp supplemented his reading with Rupert the Bear annuals, which he claimed to be of lasting value in times of emotional stress. “I still read Rupert today,” he remembered at 50. “I find it heightens my sense of my own emotions, clarifies things somehow.” Perhaps prompted by a desire to emulate his ursine hero, Stamp surprised his family at the age of 11 by persuading his mother to curl his hair with a “Toni home perm”. “My Dad was a bit worried when he saw it,” Stamp recalled. “I think he thought I was going to turn into a ‘pansy’.”

While still at primary school he developed a passionate interest in personal adornment. “I dragged my mum all over the market,” he recalled, “looking for just the right pepper and salt jacket.” By his early teens his family had given him the nickname “Lord Fauntleroy” because he spent so much time on his appearance.

After leaving grammar school, he was offered a job as a graphic artist with an advertising company, and at the age of 17 was earning twice his father’s weekly wage. He recalled being delighted when he was turned down for National Service because his feet were different sizes. “I thought I’d died and gone to heaven, two whole years to establish myself before my contemporaries caught up with me.”

As Frank Troy in Far from the Madding Crowd (1967) Credit: Rolls Press/Popperfoto

He auditioned for a place at the Webber Douglas School of Dramatic Art and, when accepted, stopped working. “I didn’t want the security of easy money to get in the way of my art,” he remembered: “I needed to devote myself totally to it.”

In 1962, Peter Ustinov offered him a screen test for the lead role in Billy Budd after having seen him on stage with a repertory company. Stamp had been instructed by his flatmate Michael Caine that film directors did not like actors to talk unnecessarily during screen tests. “I was as quiet as a corpse,” Stamp remembered. “I hardly said a word through the whole test and it seemed to work.”

By the film’s release later that year, he had become an international star. Oscar nominated for Billy Budd, he went on to make a string of successful films including Term of Trial (1962), The Collector (1965), Modesty Blaise (1966), Poor Cow (1967) and Far from the Madding Crowd (1967).

He was also emerging as a one-man caricature of the Sixties. His brief romance with Julie Christie gave the Kinks their lines about “Terry and Julie” in Waterloo Sunset. He opened a fashionable canteen, Trencherman, in Chelsea with the photographer Terence Donovan, serving nursery food. And above all he had become, with the supermodel Jean Shrimpton, part of the most beautiful – and photographed – couple in London.

With Jean Shrimpton at the premiere of his film The Collector Credit: Trevor Humphries

He described it as “the perfect sexual and emotional partnership in my life”. After three years, however, in 1968 Jean Shrimpton left Stamp when she discovered that he was receiving a percentage of her salary for organising the promotional work she undertook. “Jean was totally wrong about the money,” he recalled. “I was keeping 10 per cent but had intended to present her with a lump sum as a surprise. Stealing never was my style.”

Stamp was contracted to begin shooting a Western, Blue, in which he played a young bandit. During his time in the United States he discovered marijuana and spent most of his time when not filming smoking “Acapulco Gold”, which he bought by the kilo.

He was also initiated into an American Indian ritual involving quantities of the hallucinogen peyote. “There appeared to be a flickering pale blue light glowing from my fingertips,” he recalled. “I closed my fingers together as if about to pray and the light jumped across. Was I starting to see the blue of my own aura?”

Returning to Britain disillusioned at the end of Blue, Stamp moved to Italy. After Pasolini’s Teorema, he worked with Fellini on Spirits of the Dead and the following year appeared in The Mind of Mr Soames as a coma victim who must relearn the past 30 years.

In Pasolini’s Teorema Credit: Sunset Boulevard

But he was uninterested in the majority of parts he was offered, finding them glib and facile compared to his earlier roles in Billy Budd or The Collector. Announcing that the British “lacked emotional depth”, he departed for India in 1970.

He chose India after having spent the great part of his adolescence identifying with Tyrone Power in the 1946 film Razor’s Edge. Power played a young soldier, questioning the meaning of life, who is sent to India by a de-frocked priest and leaves Gene Tierney behind to seek enlightenment.

After travelling through India, Stamp spent some time with the Bagwhan Rajneesh in Poona where he began wearing saffron robes and practising yoga. “I got spotty as a vegetarian,” Stamp recalled, but held that “on a macrobiotic diet you stay beautiful for ever, you never grow old.”

During his sojourn in India Stamp was offered very little work. “They couldn’t give me away,” he recalled, “everybody had forgotten I existed. David Puttnam offered me three grand to do That’ll Be the Day, it was a terrible shock.” He continued to live in Poona, at the Blue Diamond Hotel, until in 1978 he received a telegraph addressed to “Clarence Stamp at the Rough Diamond”, offering him the part of the evil alien General Zod in Superman.

As General Zod with Christopher Reeve’s Superman Credit: Allstar/WARNER BROS

Superman was an enormous box-office success and Stamp appeared in the sequel made the following year. He went on to make several forgettable films in Italy, including Divine Nymph (1979), Amo Non Amo (1979) and Meetings with Remarkable Men (1979).

But his career was rehabilitated, and during the Eighties he made at least one film a year, choosing prestigious projects such as Stephen Frears’s The Hit (1984), in which he dazzled opposite John Hurt; Legal Eagles (1986) with Robert Redford; The Sicilian (1987), in which he gave a performance described by one critic as “languidly camp”; and Wall Street (1987), as Sir Larry Wildman, a character modelled on Sir James Goldsmith.

During the filming of Legal Eagles, Stamp started writing his memoirs (“I had a lot of spare time waiting for Robert Redford to come onto the set”). What was intended as a short homage to his late parents developed into a three-volume autobiography.

Condemned by some critics as self-indulgent, the three books dwelt at length on Stamp’s East End childhood (“I knew the melody, it was Little Dolly Daydreams, the song Granny Kate would sing when she made my marmalade sandwiches in the kitchen at Barking Road”) and ended in 1970 with a bleak Stamp on his way to India (“an emptiness inside me that mourns, that seeps darkness into my daily existence”).

In 1990 Stamp made his first attempt at directing a film, but after three weeks the project was abandoned with a loss of $5 million. The following year he returned to acting, appearing in Twenty One opposite Patsy Kensit.

Stamp as Bernadette Bassenger in The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert 

His later film roles included the transvestite Bernadette in The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert (1994), for which he won a Bafta; an assassin in The Limey (1999); and a general in Valkryie (2008). He glumly revisited General Zod territory with a cameo in Star Wars: Episode 1 – The Phantom Menace (1999).

Despite flashes of brilliance, it was agreed that his career had never scaled the heights it once seemed to promise. The critic David Thomson wondered whether it was because Stamp was “chilly, difficult, a loner – or does he just give haughtily good imitations of these qualities? Whatever, it is remarkable that he hasn’t been more important: for he is a good actor… and seldom far from magic at his best.”

Terence Stamp remained unmarried until 2002, when he took as his wife Elizabeth O’Rourke, some 30 years his junior; the marriage was dissolved in 2008.

In later life he lived an almost ascetic existence in his rooms at Albany in Piccadilly. He travelled by bus (with a bus pass), spent little on food and nothing on clothes. “Everything I have is made-to-measure,” he said, “it will last longer than I will, besides I’m middle-aged and past all that now.”

He devoted two hours a day to meditation and yoga and claimed that he taught his numerous godchildren to recite mantras and to stand on their heads. “I’ve reached the point where all philosophy is essentially the same,” he recalled, “it has the same flavour, like eating honey.”

Pope Francis’s death 1936–2025 ✎

Poor man. Pope Francis was really ill.

He appeared publicly only 24 hours earlier wishing worshippers in St Peter’s Square a Happy Easter.

He had a remarkable life.

A v. interesting article about his life in “Pope Francis – obituary”. I have excerpted: 

Bergoglio soon confronted a matter of life and death. As Provincial, he had asked some priests living in a “base community”, in a very poor district of Buenos Aires called Villa 1-11-14, to return to living in a Jesuit community house. Two of the priests, Fr Franz Jalics and Fr Orlando Yorio, refused to obey. The matter dragged on for more than a year, and in March 1976, after the intervention of Fr Pedro Arrupe, the worldwide head of the Society of Jesus, the priests were deemed to have resigned from the Jesuits. Bergoglio urged them to leave Villa 1-11-14 for their own safety and he offered them rooms in the provincial curia until their own plans were finalised. Five days later, a military coup overthrew the government.

On May 23, the two priests were abducted. Days after his election, Pope Francis was accused of having done too little to prevent their kidnap and torture. The accusation was that if Fr Bergoglio had let the regime know that he endorsed the priests’ work among slum dwellers, then the death squads would not have picked upon them. But it was by no means clear that this would have saved them. Once they disappeared, Bergoglio took brave and repeated steps to rescue them from the armed forces. He even appealed privately in person to the dictator Jorge Videla. The priests were released after five months. Yorio died in 2000, but the surviving priest, Franz Jalics, issued a statement in March 2013 making it clear he did not blame Pope Francis for his abduction. The two men had been reconciled in an emotional meeting.

In other cases, Bergoglio sheltered people on church property, often hiding refugees at the Colegio Máximo. To help one man, he even gave him his own identity papers, since they looked alike, allowing him to travel from Argentina disguised in a dog-collar. While Bergoglio was Provincial, none of the Jesuit priests for whom he was responsible lost his life. In looking back at the Dirty War, he emphasised its moral confusion: “There were Christians who killed as guerrillas, Christians who helped save people, and repressive Christians who believed they were saving the Homeland.” Bergoglio sought to recover from the horrors he had seen with the help of visits to a psychiatrist.

In 1980, after nearly seven years as Provincial, Fr Bergoglio was made rector of the Colegio Máximo. He built up the numbers of recruits to the Jesuit vocation and founded a new church in a poor district. When rampant inflation impoverished ordinary people, he raised sheep and pigs on the college land to provide food. Soon 400 children a day were being fed, which kept the Jesuit students very busy.

David Lynch died (1946-2025) ✎

Last week, David Lynch passed away. Aged 78.

I don’t know much about this chap other than he directed one of my all-time favourite films: The Elephant Man.

Based on the true story of Joseph Merrick who suffered the most severe deformities. His doctors found it impossible to treat and cure, especially his curved spine enlarged skull.

What is unfathomable was his sweet, gentle and kind soul in the face of such nastiness, cruelty and such backwardness.

A raw and moving film with a stellar cast, it’s a special film which I have reviewed on this blog.

Jimmy Carter (1924-2024) ✎

President Carter is well before my time, so I only know what I’ve read about him over the years.

I think he was a misunderstood president who occupied the office of the Presidency during a particularly turbulent period - e.g. the Iran hostage crisis and inflation.

He was a dignified man who’s passing reminds us of a time when public discourse was a lot more respectful & dignified. 

Probably, the last decent American president ... and one of the few in recent history NOT to increase his net worth by million after their presidency. That says a lot to me.

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Update: I found this Channel 4 new piece “Jimmy Carter: how he’s eradicating the guinea worm”:

John Prescott (1938-2024) ✎

So, he died.

I don’t know if I agree with Mr Prescott’s positions or views (probably not) — but he was representative of the pre-Blair Britain (much better than today).

The Labour Party used to be about the working classes and “blue collar” jobs ... and were always a bit nervous of the natural right-wing views of their voting base. 

Today, unions are more “white collar”, public sector, and concerned with identity politics. What does it mean to be “working class” now?

For Prescott, my impression is that he sounded the battle cry in opposition; and in his moment of glory, turned a bit toothless. Perhaps unfair? 

At any rate, he was inimitable. 

Dame Maggie Smith (1934–2024) ✎

Such sad news today. 

Dame Maggie Smith dies aged 89.

She had a very long and productive life. 

Although I have never watched any “Downton Abbey” (of which she is esteemed) — I remember her as Granny Wendy in “Hook”, “Sister Act”, and the imperishable & quintessential Professor McGonagall from the Harry Potter films.

My earliest childhood memory of her is as the house mistress, Mrs. Medlock, in “The Secret Garden”. That film enchanted me most of my childhood, and I rewatched it a few years ago only to be shocked (1) that it was Maggie Smith and (2) how young she looked.

I came across this photo on the BBC:

“Queen Elizabeth II was presented to Maggie Smith by Sir Laurence Olivier at the 1966 London charity premiere of the film Othello.”

What a treasure!

Glynis Johns (1923-2024) – RIP to Mrs Banks from Mary Poppins ✎

Mrs Glynis Johns – thank you for 100 wonderful years of entertainment! 

This Disney classic was such a huge part of my childhood. 

Go fly a kite up to heaven!

Tom Wilkinson (1948–2023) & Richard Rampton KC (1941–2023) – RIP ✎

Really sad to hear this news yesterday, Tom Wilkinson was a terrific actor.

One of my favourite roles of his was Lord Cornwallis in 'The Patriot': "Tavington ... Damn him! Damn that man!". He was also a really great as Benjamin Franklin in John Adams. Playing both sides of that conflict.

He was also a terrific villain in 'Batman Begins'. A great add to any movie he was in. I'll always like the fact that he went against the general advice to change his last name to something more 'marketable'. 

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Another one of my favourite was the barrister in 'Denial'.

In a v. strange twist, Richard Rampton KC has also recently passed away. Rampton represented Lipstadt and Penguin against David Irving in a libel trial in the Royal Courts of Justice. It was subsequently adapted into a film and Tom Wilkinson played Rampton. So, here's goodbye to both gentleman. 

 

From The Daily Telegraph's obituary:

Richard Rampton, KC, who has died aged 82, was widely regarded as one of the greatest defamation lawyers of his generation; a deceptively avuncular yet formidably incisive advocate, he was also a leading authority on libel law as co-author of the seminal textbook on the subject, Duncan and Neill on Defamation.

The case was seen as extremely important for Jewish communities around the world, its significance reflected in the fact that it gave rise to three separate non-fiction books and some years later a film, Denial (2016), scripted by David Hare and directed by Mike Jackson. Rampton was played by the actor Tom Wilkinson, who brilliantly captured everything from the manner in which he walked to the way in which he smoked his Gitanes cigarettes, and the forensic and authoritative manner in which he conducted himself in court – refusing for instance to look Irving in the eye in order to better “get under his skin”.

As Rampton’s son, the journalist James Rampton, wrote later: “Even the way Wilkinson opens a very agreeable bottle of red over lunch and delivers the line ‘a famous Attorney-General once told me that one becomes a much more effective advocate after a few glasses of claret’ is eerily reminiscent of him.”

Lord Walker of Gestingthorpe (1938–2023) ✎

The former Supreme Court Justice Lord Walker has recently passed away.

Below are some interesting extracts from his obituary in the DT. 

A few years ago, I enjoyed watching his lecture on "Cause & Effect in Commercial Law" as the 25th lecture as part of the Sultan Azlan Shah Law Lectures.

For me, as a law student, some of his judgments which stand out are:

• Kernott v Jones [2011] - the beneficial entitlement of a 'family home' of an unmarried couple under constructive trust.
• Pitt v Holt [2013] - Mentioned below in the article. The issue was the jurisdiction of the court to set aside a voluntary disposition on the grounds of mistake. 
• Sempra Metals Ltd v HMRC [2007] - A v. important case in unjust enrichment. His Lordship preferred the approach (in my view, mistaken) to extend the court's equitable jurisdiction to awards of compound interest to achieve "complete restitution" thereby reversing the unjust enrichment for the principal and the interest. (Later, comprehensively overturned, by a differently constituted court in Prudential Assurance v HMRC [2018]).
• FII Group Litigation v HMRC [2012] - Among other things, whether a demand from the public authority could trigger an unjust enrichment claim under the Woolwich principle. His lordship's view was that it was about the perceived obligation to pay, rather than an implicit demand.
• BNY Corporate Trustees v Eurosail [2013] - Part of the Lehman Brothers fallout. This appeal concerned the correct test for "balance-sheet" insolvency in corporate insolvency.
• Pell Frischmann Engineering v Bow Valley Iran [2009] - Lord Walker (sitting on the Privy Council) laid down guidance on how Wrotham Park damages (or negotiated damages) should be assessed and awarded. It stands apart from later Supreme Court jurisprudence because His Lordship held that it was not a prerequisite to their being awarded for the claimant to have applied for an injunction (as per Lord Cairn's Act).
• Mobil Cerro v Petroleos [2008] - In this case, Robert Walker J waived the normal subject-matter jurisdiction (for international fraud) in the granting of freezing injunctions. It's a landmark case that expanded the jurisdiction of the court for this private international remedy.
• Highland Crusader v Deutsche Bank AG [2009] - Lord Walker (in the Court of Appeal) clarified important jurisprudence about the ambit of anti-suit injunctions following commencement of proceedings in violation of jurisdiction agreements.

The Daily Telegraph:

Lord Walker of Gestingthorpe, who has died aged 85, was an outstanding Law Lord and Justice of the Supreme Court, and previously the doyen of the Chancery Bar, second to none in the field of private client trusts and taxation work.

Called to the Bar by Lincoln’s Inn in 1960, he became a tenant at 17 Old Buildings, and soon became highly regarded as an equity barrister with a thriving estate duty practice, dealing with the implications of the Variation of Trusts Act (1958).

His advice and drafting stood out for clarity, precision and quiet persuasiveness. His advocacy displayed the same qualities, meaning that judges paid attention to his submissions in a way that they might not with more long-winded counsel. 

Walker became a Lord of Appeal in Ordinary (Law Lord) in 2002, and a Justice of the Supreme Court when it was established in 2009.

Among the appeal cases at which he presided during his final years as a judge was Pitt v Holt (2013), where his judgment restricting the scope of the ruling in the case of Hastings-Bass (which had allowed the court to set aside decisions made by trustees if the decisions had unintended consequences), so that it applied only if the trustees had committed a breach of fiduciary duty, was widely held to be a tour de force.

With his keen moral sense, astonishing mastery of detail and ability always to see the bigger picture, Walker was an exemplary judge, adept at identifying what should be the right result in each case and then finding ways of arriving at it without compromising legal principles.

He regularly surprised both judicial colleagues and counsel with his ability to master areas of the law distinct from his original field of expertise, and in numerous judgments he contributed greatly to the development of the law across all areas. Renowned for the kind welcome he gave to new members of the Supreme Court, he was also an exceptionally good advocacy teacher at Lincoln’s Inn, where he served as Treasurer in 2010.

Sir Nicholas Stadlen (1950–2023) ✎

A few weeks back, I came across an obituary in the paper for Sir Nicholas Stadlen which really amazed me. (Can be read on Daily Telegraph).

He was a v. successful barrister and High Court judge; but he also had an extraordinary formative stint in the United States. He was around when Martin Luther King was assassinated and also worked for Senator McCarthy. 

I especially enjoyed reading about his advocacy at the Bar. I had already heard of the late Gordon Pollock QC (from two different barristers) and he seemed like another amazing personality at the Bar.

He was called to the Bar by Inner Temple in 1976 and obtained a tenancy in Tom Bingham’s chambers at Fountain Court, the leading commercial set previously headed by Leslie Scarman and Melford Stevenson. Stadlen’s pupil master there was Denis Henry, later a Court of Appeal judge.

Stadlen took Silk in 1991, and seven years later featured in a newspaper list of QCs reported to have earned more than £1 million gross during the previous year.

For his junior counsel, it could be arduous getting him ready for court as he liked to leave no stone unturned. Several days might be spent over a single paragraph in a skeleton argument. However, his team relished the moment they unleashed him on the court, and – even more so – on the other side. Stadlen was at his best when he departed from any prepared script and went into free flow, often in response to a question from the judge. His unchained advocacy was a sight to behold and, with his wonderfully mellifluous speaking voice, mesmerising to listen to. 

Nick Stadlen’s keen intellect and sense of justice were allied to immense powers of concentration and a seemingly inexhaustible capacity for case preparation, the often chaotic state of his room belying his complete mastery of any brief by the time it came to court, affording him apparent foresight of every conceivable counter-argument to his submissions and enabling him to perform fearlessly and persuasively on his feet with barely a glance at his papers.

His advocacy was never more thorough and effective than during his 119-day marathon speech in 2004/05 at the Royal Courts of Justice, opening the case for the defence on behalf of the Bank of England against a compensation claim brought by the liquidators of the collapsed bank BCCI.

It was the longest speech in British legal history, easily beating the previous record set by his opponent in the same case, Gordon Pollock QC, who had spent 79 days setting out the case of the liquidators.

When Pollock eventually concluded his opening remarks, Stadlen rose to his feet in July 2004 to address the bench: “After six months,” he began, “the empire strikes back.”

During Pollock’s opening, there had been a real sense that the Bank of England and 22 of its employees might be in trouble, but by the time Stadlen finished his epic reply in May 2005, the dismissal of BCCI’s claim seemed inevitable.

After the plaintiffs eventually conceded defeat that December, the judge Mr Justice Tomlinson rebuked their counsel for his “sustained rudeness” during the case to Stadlen, to whom, by contrast, he paid abundant tribute: “Your address to me was a tour de force, if I may say so, and no doubt it is something for which your clients are deeply grateful, but I am deeply grateful to you for your very great assistance given to me throughout this case.” The judge subsequently granted Stadlen a £100 million costs order.

I also found a YouTube video of Sir Stadlen discussing Nelson Mandela and the anti-apartheid movement.

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Sir Michael John Gambon (1940–2023) ✎

What a sad loss. 

Sir Michael Gambon was a wonderful actor with an amazing career. I will always remember him as the lovely old grandad in Charlotte Gray (a romantic war drama). His character and performance has always stayed with me.

He was excellent in Layer cake; and of course, I have especially enjoyed his turn as Dumbledore (from the Harry Potter films). He has always had a powerful screen presence. 

I've watched a few interviews on YouTube and he strikes me as a lovely man off screen.

So long sir. One of the great postwar actors.

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From today's Telegraph:

Sir Michael Parkinson dies (1935–2023) ✎

So poor old Parky has died.

I have such fond memories of my mum watching him. He was a regular Saturday night viewing for the family.

I recently watched a Mel Gibson film; and went to watch one of his interviews. Then, I stumbled across his Parkinson interview only a few days ago; and I really enjoyed it. It was just so absorbing and engaging. Old school class. 

That's before British chat shows had veered towards being comedy routines. Parkinson would be entertaining without the scripted 'story time' routine of Graham Norton (invariably with his own jokes). Graham Norton's entire formula is "so please tell us about the time ...."  or  "... what's this funny story I heard ...". Michael Parkinson was entertaining with some class and gravitas; and allowing the audience to learning something about the interviewee.

I didn't appreciate it at the time, but television has really declined in my own time.

So, respect to the man.

Tony Bennett (1926–2023) ✎

The legendary New York pop and jazz singer died last week aged 96.

I've been listening to his "I left my heart in San Francisco" this week. What a beautiful voice. It's made me want to get started into some Jazz.

His passing marks the end of an era. A classy national treasure. One of the great jazz crooners.

I've read a few of his obituaries. He was drafted to fight in WWII, and it seems present at the liberation of a concentration gamp in Germany. He also grew up in poverty and lived through the Great Depression. Truly the last of his era. 

I'll be listening to some more of his music. RIP

In memory of Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood 1937–2023 ✎

This week, our former Law Lord and Supreme Court Justice Lord Brown passed away.

I enjoyed reading his obituary in the Daily Telegraph. At university, I rarely came across his judgments. Not only did he have a very brief stint at the Supreme Court, but he appears to 'focused' on judicial review (which is public law). At university, I was mostly focused on private law.

He came from a Jewish emigre family, did National Services in Cyprus, read history at Oxford, was called to the Bar and did his pupillage at Crown Office Row. Observed some interesting cases, and appeared against George Carman QC, and was involved in some IRA-related cases. 

In particular, I liked reading this:

Brown recalled that his dissent rate as a Law Lord increased the more experienced and confident he became, having at first been “in thrall” to his colleagues’ legal expertise and authority. His ultimate support for Jonathan Sumption’s appointment to the Supreme Court directly from practice at the Bar was based on what he saw as the “excessive soft-heartedness of a number of my colleagues” and the need for an injection of the “stern intellectual rigour and legal conservatism” he felt Sumption could provide.

Another interesting paragraph from The Spectator:

He was also highly critical of the Supreme Court’s decision in Evans (2015), which concerned the so-called ‘black-spider memos’ written by Prince Charles, as he then was, to ministers. The majority judgments, requiring disclosure of the letters, effectively excised from the Freedom of Information Act 2000 the Attorney General’s statutory power to block disclosure of information in the public interest. Brown wrote that the judgments ‘are not merely mistaken but give rise to a worrying impression of a tendency towards judicial supremacism. I should certainly have joined [the] dissent.’

I really enjoyed reading that paragraph. 

The very important Supreme Court case Evans v Attorney General concerned the relationship between the courts and Parliament. Professor Mark Elliott has a blog on the case. In short, Parliament conferred a power on the Attorney General to override decisions of a judicial tribunal body. In this case, it concerned the obligation to release King Charles's letters under the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

I completely agree with the minority judgment (and Lord Brown) that Parliamentary sovereignty requires the courts to give effect to the clear will of Parliament through statute; or as per Lord Wilson in his dissent: rewriting not interpretation.

Well, farewell then Lord Brown, and your interesting life.

On the passing of Queen Elizabeth II ✎

Queen Elizabeth II by Pietro Annigoni.

What a sad day.

An icon of world history has just died. I must admit that the news of her passing did make me tear up a little – despite ofc not knowing her. She was a remarkable lady who had a profound impact on our nation and the world.

It’s a mark of how well she reigned – despite an age of monarchies being uprooted and republics replacing them – that her passing has touched so many people with many beautiful gestures and tributes from across the world. 

The Eiffel Tower had gone dark, Rio de Janeiro’s Christ the Redeemer has been lit up in the colours of the Union Jack, the Sydney Opera House, American flags were lowered at half-mast at all American embassies.

I have known of no other passing which has had such a marked worldwide effect.

Our late Queen embodied the true essence of the Crown. The incarnation of Walter Bagehot’s characterisation of the “dignified”. Despite her personal life and family matters being covered and heavily scrutinised by the media, she maintained her air of dignity and respect. The Queen tied the nation to its heritage, values, and history. Thus, as a beacon of stability and continuity, she united it.

It was fitting that Her Majesty greeted her new Premier a day before her passing. Her sense of duty undiminished even towards her final hours. As ever, she put the public first and simply got on with her duty. I have read that she was the most photographed person of all time.

An amazing lady.